First Reaping
by Excited-Insomniac
Summary: Prim remembers Katniss' first reaping at her own.


**First Reaping**

I think about Katniss' first reaping as Mayor Undersee tells us all the history of the Games. I was eight when she was twelve. I stood with my mother in the crowd, clutching her hand and praying that my sister wouldn't be taken away. Our father's death was fresh then. I couldn't bear to lose another member of our small family.

I felt that my body had been turned to iron: I could not move a muscle, I could not look at anything but Effie on the stage, I could not even cry. Katniss had told me not to worry. It was only her first year, and even though she had entered for tesserae, her name was only in there a few times. And she wasn't taken: a fourteen year old named Nan Shepherd went into the arena that year, doomed to die in the opening bloodbath. When Effie called Nan's name though, my relief was so intense that my knees gave out and I started to cry. I didn't know Nan. I had barely ever seen her before. But just then I loved her with an intensity bordering on insanity. I loved her because she was not Katniss. She would go to the arena so that my sister wouldn't have to. She saved her life.

Over the years, I loved Ora, Hailey, and Bryn with a similar passion as Katniss got older and stayed safe.

And now it is my first reaping. Katniss has not allowed me to sign up for tesserae. My name is entered only once, out of all the thousands of slips of paper, twenty of which belong to Katniss.

Twenty is not such a large number, out of thousands. There are other girls who have more than her. Not many others, but a few. Seam girls with big families to help with. But twenty is a huge number because each slip with 'Katniss Everdeen' on it is a different way she could die.

Effie comes to the front of the stage. "Happy Hunger Games!" she trills. "And may the odds be _ever_ in your favor!" Her speech about how honored she is to be here gets less enthusiastic every year. Everyone knows she hates it here. I've never known any other Capitol person. I wonder what it must be like there. Is everyone as silly as her?

"Ladies first!" she chirps and my stomach turns to lead. Let it be anyone but Katniss… anyone, I don't care who…

She dips her hand into the glass ball full of girls' names, digs deep. Selects one. Brings it back to the podium. Anyone but Katniss, anyone…

She reads the name.

"Primrose Everdeen."

Everyone draws away from me, as if being reaped were catching. Girls I know from school. Seam and merchant, kind and cruel. They're all scared of me now. _I'm_ scared.

I force my feet to take me forward. Right, left, right, like Peacekeepers on parade. I feel my shirt come untucked at the back. 'Quack,' I think irrationally.

I do not look around for Katniss or our mother as I pace towards the stage. I do not think I could if I wanted to. The world seems too bright somehow.

'I do not want this.' The thought comes to me fully formed.

'No,' another part of me says. 'But would you rather it was her?'

I hate the Games for making me ask such questions. I am nearing the steps.

"Prim!" The voice is a squeak behind me. "Prim!"

I look around and see Katniss rushing towards me through the crowd of older kids, eyes wild. When she gets to me, she pushes me behind her and cries "I volunteer! I volunteer as tribute!"

A gush of icy dread roots me to the spot. I do not hear the words Effie says, or the Mayor, not until he says "Let her come forward."

Then I start so scream. "No! Katniss, no! You can't go!" I lock my arms around her waist, forbidding her from leaving me.

"Prim, let go," she growls. "Let go!"

I feel hands on me, large strong ones, pulling me away. I cannot tell who it is, but I fight them, kicking and scratching and shrieking. Didn't they understand that for a moment I had saved her? That for a moment, terrified and unwilling though I was, I loved myself like I had love Nan and Ora and Hailey and Bryn?

Gale—I recognize that it is Gale holding me, he said something to Katniss—Gale carries me away to my mother as Katniss climbs to the stage. Effie twitters around her, but I can't hear. All I know is that Katniss is gone.

**A/N: This was a thought I had at three in the morning the other day. Kinda short, kinda random, and I'm sure this kind of thing has been done before, but I've been having sistery feels lately. Hope you like! **

**All characters are owned by Suzanne Collins.**

**E.I. signing out**


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